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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ao the Overkitty" data-source="post: 1325771" data-attributes="member: 9758">Cure sticks.  LOTS and LOTS of cure sticks.  This is where most of our cash goes.  When we're on our property, there are two clerics (9th & 5th) and a paladin (3rd) around that can help heal us up, but they stay far out of combat, since we've already had 2 cohorts die in our combats (and because the DM doesn't want to slow down combat further with more combatants).  The first one (my first cohort) was torched to -44hp from full by a Red Dragon's breath. We're waiting for spring (in game) to go on the "quest" needed to get him back.  The second to die was the cleric cohort of our Fighter/Barbarian.  She got crushed to death by a Sapphire dragon. Needless to say, the cleric didn't want to go into battle with us anymore and is much happier to stay on the property where it is safe.  I use safe there in the loosest sense possible, because Ogre Mage Assassins regularly show up to try and kill us in our sleep.So, we try and make sure the ranger and myself each have a cure stick, if we can.  Over this winter, the crafting cohort is going to be using up a lot of our amassed xp to be stockpiling cure mod or cure serious wands (since cure lights don't work too well in combat anymore).So the lay on hands is usually used in the heat of battle.  After battle, we spend a fair amount of time draining the cure sticks to get eveyone feeling healthy again.He's not.  He was built as more of a social character.  His skills and feats are focused on things other then combat.  I supposse you could consider his Extra Song and Improved Turning feats to be combat feats, but that's as close as he gets to them.I usually try and hit for a couple of rounds, realize that's silly, then start singing.  If we're going into a big combat and we know it, I start singing before we get in there.  Sure, that cuts out any surprise, but we're not a very stealthy group out of habit.Oh. I've already tested that theory.  When I was taking bard levels in the beginning, I wore no armor (which hurt a lot).  My character now has a fear of housecats, since they beat him up very bad [First round of combat, he was dropped to 0hp.  He drank a CLW potion and got max results out of it.  Second round, they dropped him back to 0hp.  He was 3rd level at the time and these were ordinary housecats (we had been damaged earlier in the day and hadn't been able to fully heal, though)].  He put on fullplate the second he became proficient in it.  If he could get glamoured fullplate of ease, he'd never take his armor off.  He rememebers fully what it was like to run around without armor.  it hurt a lot (not that it doesn't still hurt even withb the fullplate, but he rarely drops nowadays, which he equates to the armor).As for the armor, since I don't regularly use the shield, my arcane spell failure chance is only 35%.  I usually make the check and have two of my bard spells with only verbal components.  I don't worry about casting spells in combat much, since it is generally only Featherfall or Expeditous Retreat that get cast and I normally don't have to worry about having a hand free when I do cast ExP.  Besides, he prefers the merciful greatsword because killing is generally not a good idea, in his opinion (especially if they're humanoid).  It's also a difference of only 1 point of attack but 3d6+5 vs 1d8+6 damage.Since he's a Paladin, taking more Bard levels would require him to become unlawful and lose his Paladinhood.  So, no ranks of UMD for him.  If I had known UMD was going to become a cross-class skill in 3.5, I might have built him differently in that regard, but it's a little late for that.As for Improved Disarm, he's not quite smart enough to take the Combat Expertise tree (and it's a little late in the game to be starting a tree).</blockquote>

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